Obedience to Christ Firm Foundation

I remember I was driving in my car and I saw a bumper sticker on a pickup truck in front of me and when I read it I got mad. You know those bumper stickers that you see? There's one that's popular today. It's got all those religious symbols on it with a peace sign and everything else alongside a cross and it says coexist.

Like all religions are the same and you better be politically correct and get along with all of them and not be judgmental about them. Just coexist and I believe that particular bumper sticker is right on some things because there's many folks represented on that bumper sticker coexist which are going to coexist for a very long time in a very hot place for all eternity because most folks believe the road to heaven is a broadway that's all inclusive to all world religions but there's only one way to heaven friends and that's through the precious blood of Jesus Christ. But this one bumper sticker I saw on that pickup truck that day made me mad.

It read God cheated you and the more I read those words the madder I got. I thought to myself what kind of atheist would go around with a bumper sticker saying God cheated you. So I sped up my car with the intention of pulling up beside the driver of that truck to get a good look at him and when I got closer to that truck I realized that the bumper sticker did not say God cheated you but rather it read God created you.

There was a Christian man driving that truck and I was about to get mad at him. I got hot under the collar for nothing because I couldn't see clearly enough. I read it wrong and I believe friends we can do that in the Christian life.

We can look at things in the wrong way. As a Christian I can convince myself that service is everything. The more I do for God the better.

In fact that's how a lot of Baptist churches operate where it's full steam ahead and business all the time. Mission trips here and outreaches there. Something has to be going on at the church at all times because Christians need to stay busy for the Lord and we can get a lot accomplished in the name of God with money and manpower.

So we busy ourselves to death with service and kingdom work. Oftentimes we wear ourselves out with service but I believe we're looking at things wrong. I think my service to God is not the important thing.

How much I've done for him in my life. I don't believe that's how God looks at me. He's not looking at my service and good works in his name as much as he's looking for obedience from me.

Obedience to Christ. Old King Saul was busy ransacking a city. I'm thinking he did good in the sight of God but when the prophet Samuel showed up he pointed out King Saul's great error.

King Saul greeted Samuel by starting to brag on himself and saying, yea I have obeyed the voice of the Lord and have gone the way which the Lord sent me and have brought Agag the king of Amalek and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites but the people took of the spoil a sheep and oxen and chief of things which should have been utterly destroyed to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God and Gilgal. You see friends Old King Saul is defending himself here saying look here see what I've done for God. We took all the best and gave it to God and Samuel has to straighten Saul out because Saul's looking at things wrong.

He's looking at himself wrong. In verse 22 in chapter 15 of 1 Samuel has the prophet's answer to the disobedient king and Samuel said half the Lord is great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord. Behold to obey is better than sacrifice and to hearken than the fad of rams and when I read that passage from 1 Samuel friends I see that I often as a Christian look at things wrong in regard to my life as a believer.

God's not so much interested in my service to him as he is in my obedience to him. The typical church member today tithes and serves and is busy in the work of the Lord but in their private life they still sit on the throne of their life and rule there. Jesus is not king in their lives that's why many can claim to be a Christian by resting on what they've done for God and completely ignore obeying his voice in their life in obedience to God.

They can get away with sin and all they want to as long as they're busy for God and their service to him but God says no to obey is better than sacrifice and to hearken to the command of God better than all the worship you can give him. Now I'm going to make a statement friends that won't be popular but I believe it's biblical. Sometimes we preachers have to be unbiblical to be popular with our crowds but I want to make a biblical statement that won't sit well with some of you because it goes against what many of you've been taught in the church for the last 40 years or so but let me make this statement because it has to do with your salvation.

Some of you within the sound of my voice may not be viewing yourselves properly. Your bumper sticker may be out of whack as far as what you think it says. Some of you may believe yourself to be a Christian and that you sit upon a strong solid foundation that is unshakable as you serve God on your way to heaven but there may be someone within the sound of my voice that's sitting upon a false foundation of carnal security because you believe your hope of heaven rests on your good opinion of yourself and your long track record of service to God.

Now hear me out as I make the final one statement. Listen friends, you have never been saved unless you wanted to be saved from sinning. That is my statement.

Let me repeat it for your benefit. You have never been saved unless you wanted to be saved from sinning. Now that's a hard one to swallow in your day and mine of a once saved always saved mentality that lets you join the church and be baptized and still sin all you want to and still believe you're on your way to heaven.

If all your salvation experience was that you decided you didn't want to go to hell then you don't really know the Lord Jesus Christ because he came to save people from their sins. Do you hear me friends? He came to save folks from their sins not to keep you in them with a false hope of heaven because unless he can save people from their sins he will have to send you to hell because he must be true to his holy nature. Now some of you may be getting uneasy as you listen to me but please hear me out.

Wouldn't you want to know if you're looking at yourself wrong? Wouldn't you want to know if you've seen yourself saved but God himself has never saved you? Wouldn't you want to know so you can try to do something about it now before you die in your sins and are cast into that burning hell of misery and torment forever and ever. It'll be too late then friend. You can't get out of hell once you shut up in that prison of darkness and torment.

Listen friend there was a time in my own life where I thought I was saved and on my way to heaven. I was a good church member and good standing. I made a decision for Christ and walked an aisle and repeated a prayer and accepted Jesus as my personal savior.

I was baptized. I joined the church and I taught Sunday school for 15 years but I was lost friend. I was nothing more than a church member who was placing my hope of heaven on a good opinion of myself and a long track record of service but I was looking at things wrong.

My bumper sticker did not read saved but lost. I didn't know it because I was not seeing myself as God saw me. I was deceived by the modern evangelism tactics and a watered down gospel message and easy believism.

I did what the pastor told me to do but I was on my way to hell and I didn't know it. Obedience to Christ is the main cog in the wheel of the life of a true believer and if you want to be saved but you don't want to be saved from your sins then your salvation is nothing more than a hole in the wall because you've never been saved unless you wanted to be saved from sinning. You can't have a halfway commitment to God friend.

He demands a full surrender of all you have and all you are. Jesus must be a complete master. The rich young ruler parted company with Jesus because he wanted a halfway solution to the kingdom of God but Jesus pointed out to that rich young man that there was a stumbling block between him and Jesus and that was his covetousness.

I like what Vance Havner had to say about the rich young ruler. He said the rich young ruler was a good boy but he wasn't God's boy. Let me ask you friend do you just want to know if you're not looking at yourself in the proper light of eternity in regard to your salvation? If you're lost wouldn't you want to find out now before you die and it's too late? I want us to examine our theme today on obedience.

Obedience to Christ and that's the tale of my message today friends. Obedience to Christ a firm foundation. Turn in your bibles to the gospel of Matthew in chapter 7. We're going to be in verses 21 through 27.

You can turn there now. In the preceding passage of this passage in Matthew in verses 12 through 20 Jesus is speaking of two contrasting things, two ways, one narrow, one broad, two trees, one good, one corrupt, two fruits, one good and one evil. Then in our passage Jesus speaks of two foundations, one which is solid and one which is false.

One stands to test time and one breaks apart and falls to pieces but each of these contrasting things of two speak of a convert as opposed to a lost person or a false professor. You see friends everything boils down to our obedience to Christ. If our salvation experience is that we only want an insurance policy to be saved from the fires of hell but we don't want to be saved from our sins then our hope of heaven is on a false foundation and it's nothing more than a hole in the wall.

Now some of you don't like that but I was not called a god to preach to please man but to please God and bring him glory. I'm not seeking your approval but I am seeking your salvation from your sins. I want to read the striking passage of scripture to you now friends from Matthew's gospel which records the words of our Lord Jesus Christ as he describes a true convert as opposed to a deceived false professor.

Let me begin in verse 21. Here now is the word of God. Let the spirit of the Lord be pleased to attend the reading of his holy word.

Not everyone that saith unto me Lord, Lord shall enter into the kingdom of heaven but he that doeth the will of my father which is in heaven many will say to me in that day Lord, Lord have we not prophesied in thy name and in thy name have cast out devils and in thy name done many wonderful works and then will I profess unto them I never knew you depart from me ye that work iniquity therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock and the rain descended and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon that house and it fell not for it was founded upon a rock and everyone that heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them not should be likened unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand and the rain descended and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon that house and it fell and great was the fall of it now friends I will stop there Jesus is speaking of the contrast between a saved person and a lost person even though the lost person thinks he's saved he's not seeing himself in the proper light as God sees him he's resting on a good opinion of himself on a track record of service Lord Lord he says look at all the things I've done for you during my life look and see I did this and I did that and I gave here and I served there look at me I deserve heaven because I've been busy for you but the man has not seen himself in the proper light his spiritual eyesight is poor he thinks his bumper sticker spells saved but really it spells lost Jesus hears him out and then declares to that person I never knew you depart from me ye that work iniquity and the key friends to a solid foundation of true saving faith is found in verse 21 which reads not everyone that saith unto me Lord Lord shall enter into the kingdom of heaven but he that doeth the will of my father which is in heaven and look at what Jesus says in verse 24 friends therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock so Christ makes the great distinction between a saved person and a lost person and that is obedience to Christ to obey is better than sacrifice and my salvation is not based on my good opinion of myself but on God's opinion of me my salvation is not determined by my long track record of good works and service for God but by the fruit of my obedience to God because if I'm truly saved then I will want to be saved from my sins I want to live a holy life I just want one halfway salvation where I can escape hell and still hang on to the wretched sins that will send me there you see friends the essence of salvation is to make men holy if if God allowed one unsaved one unsanctified one on regenerate sinner into heaven that sinner would turn heaven into hell Jesus said but he that doeth the will of my father who hears these sayings of mine and does them obedience is better than sacrifice and doing God's will by hearkening to him better than all the worship of the fatter rams do you see that dear friends I hope you do obedience to Christ is a firm foundation that will withstand any storm of life that the devil can throw at us we are not saved by our works friends you can't work your way to heaven but if we are truly saved then we will want to be saved we'll want to be saved from our sins and serve God faithfully in obedience to his holy word and commands there's enough hypocrites in the church already some of them stand behind the pulpit ask God to let you see yourself as you really are saved or unsaved I will leave you now friends with this exhortation from the apostle Paul it's found in 2nd Corinthians 13 5 examine yourselves whether ye be in the faith prove your own selves I know you not your own selves how that Jesus Christ is in you except ye be reprobates let us pray